Mt 11: 2-11
Dear Friends, Advent, as a season, brings a focus to hopeful waiting and joyful coming. These elements are part of the human experience. Our life is rooted in faith and expectation. It demands patience and longing for the deepest hungers in our heart. Advent is the season that gathers these deep realities and invites us into the selected scriptures of the season. They unveil God in these dimensions of our human journey. We are in the Advent mode of hope and longing throughout our life. We are always waiting for the fulfillment of God’s promises. We live in the time between the “already” of the Christ event and the “not yet” of the full experience of the Kingdom of God. Until the second Coming, the Kingdom is always partial and incomplete in human history.
Today’s readings express that tension between the final Coming and the historical saving actions of Jesus. John the Baptist’s question leads to the fundamental question that Jesus asked the disciples and us: “Who do you say I am?” (Mk 8:29)
John was confused by the ministry of Jesus. John was looking for a more demanding message. John had proclaimed the coming of a harsher and stricter judgment. At the same time, he shared the popular understanding of the Messianic hope of the people centering on liberation from Rome and prosperity for all. Jesus’ list of compassionate and mercy-filled actions fell far short of John’s dreams.
Jesus does not respond exactly to John’s question. He wants his deeds to draw John into the deeper reality he is revealing. “Go tell John what you hear and what you see” (Mt 11:4). Jesus then lists the activities he had just accomplished as portrayed by Matthew in the preceding chapters. They are in line with many statements from Isiah including today’s first reading. Jesus is challenging John to expand his horizons and dig deeper into the message of the prophets. Here he will find an opening to the Messianic activity that Jesus is disclosing and will continue to make known all the way to Calvary.
As for John, so for us, Jesus challenges our dreams and our hopes. Jesus must be the measure of what we want from God. Too often, our longings and desires are distorted by the standards of material and personal success expressed by the values of the world. We need to keep our eyes and our heart on Jesus. He will lay out the true road to our heart’s desires as expressed in today’s first reading from Isaiah. While this passage talks of the deliverance of the Jews from the hopelessness of the Babylonian captivity, we can read it as our Advent message here and now. It is our deliverance from all the consequences of sin and the evil which is so much a part of our daily experience.
Strengthen the hands that are feeble,
Make firm the knees that are weak
Say to those whose hearts are frightened:
Be strong, fear not!
Here is your God,
He comes with vindication;
With divine recompense
He comes to save you.
Then will the eyes of the blind be opened,
The ears of the deaf be cleared;
Then will the lame leap like a stag,
Then the tongue of the dumb will sing.
Those whom the Lord has ransomed will return
And enter Zion singing,
Crowned with everlasting joy;
They will meet with joy and gladness,
Sorrow and mourning will flee”
(Is 35:3-6, 10).
We gather all these deep yearnings and needs in the awesome prayer of Advent, Come, Lord Jesus!
